


Still Sleeping

by fountainkeds



Category: Starfighter (Comic)
Genre: Fluff and Angst, M/M, Sleep Deprivation, Space Loneliness
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-04-03
Updated: 2013-04-03
Packaged: 2017-12-07 08:05:31
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,060
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/746237
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fountainkeds/pseuds/fountainkeds
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Abel pretends to be asleep so Cain could shamelessly be not a jerk.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Still Sleeping

**Author's Note:**

> First fan fiction on this website and for this fandom! All rights go to HamletMachine. Seriously, what a perfect, perfect comic. Hope it's not too boring :)

Abel hated going to sleep the most. After losing his notions of day and night, rest only became about being tired and closing his eyes. There were no dreams, there were no nightmares. There was no more ceremony to falling asleep, no more mother to make him chamomile tea and no more father to gruffly remind him of his duties for the following day. There were no more nights of trying to doze off on a bed that felt too big and too cold. But even back then, lying awake in his sterile room, there was always a promise of a morning. There was a promise of a tomorrow. A promise that no longer felt relevant. Now, it felt so mechanical that Abel wondered if it was even necessary for him to sleep at all. He was floating in space and so far away from humanity, far away from sunsets and sunrises. Was he above needs? And outside his room, he hates how he can hear fighters and navigators walking by, whispering and laughing and yelling and all Abel could feel is tired.

***

He fell into a dreamless lull, without him, only to be woken up to the feeling of that hard length pressing against his back. He feigned sleep, rolled into a ball and shut his eyes slightly tighter. It wasn't to get out of fucking Cain, because Mother knows Abel was always willing and ready when the bigger man so much as breathed in his direction. It wasn't to rub it in Cain's face that he could be rejected at any time he wanted, Abel had been done with their little game of fucking power struggles. It wasn't even to try and get Cain riled up before sex. He did it for the Cain that only existed when Abel was asleep. 

***

The first time Abel had pretended to stay asleep, he had done so because he was close to tears, as he often was then. He would have rather been shot dead by a hundred Colterons than let Cain see him so emotionally raw. He'd been thinking about the promise he'd made Cain, a promise that no longer felt relevant. And that made him feel so useless and empty that in a way, it felt like dying. When he heard Cain throw his boots haphazardly across the small room, Abel just shut his eyes tighter. When he felt the mattress dip, he folded just a little bit more into himself. 

"Princess, are you awake?" 

His voice was so soft and so gentle that for a second Abel thought it wasn't really Cain sitting on the bed, but a cruel intruder with the sweetest voice he'd ever heard. When Abel didn't answer, he felt the bed dip some more, and Cain crawled over him, arms on either side of Abel's blanket swaddled body. His face was close. Abel could feel the air shooting out of his nostrils and fanning over his cheek. He could smell him, his scent of mint and blood and sweat. He was so close, like he'd been many times, countless times. So why did it feel so new? Abel thought about his promise, about his desire to protect him. 'Everyone, to protect everyone', he thought quickly. But he knew that was a lie. He only cared about protecting one person. When he was lying awake and too hot to sleep, not thinking of his mother or father or his old bed, there was only one person he saw. A dark man from the Colonies with rough hands and a sharp tongue, who was skilled in using both.

Then he felt it. A thumb across his cheek followed by what felt like a kiss, a ghost-like touch so light that Abel was almost positive it never happened. Abel wanted so desperately then to open his eyes, to be sure that it was Cain that just softly caressed his cheek and kissed him with a tenderness he was always so adamant to prove he didn't possess. Then he felt a hand harshly grabbing his ass through the blankets and he knew this was his Cain. Abel opened his eyes slowly, doing his best to seem as though he had just been awoken by the crude gesture.

"Oh, good. You're finally awake. My cock's been aching for you all day, baby." Cain said as he began to nuzzle into Abel's neck, biting at the soft parts under his ear. Abel could feel the stiffness on the back of his thigh, fluttering his eyes closed again and reveling at how hard Cain was for him. 

"You woke me up from a dream." he whispered, lolling his head back against Cain's hard chest and rolling his hips.

"Heh, what of, princess?" He began to pump Abel's hardening erection, swirling his thumb around the pearling liquid at the tip and licking day old bruises on his shoulder, making Abel writhe like a glowworm in the dark.

"Hah..I was..ah…dreaming about something nice." 

Cain kissed down Abel's body, between his milky thighs, and chuckled. 

"I bet I can show you something way fucking nicer."  
And he did.

***

The second time Abel pretended to stay asleep was to prove to himself how foolish he was to think those seconds when Cain was more like a lover and less like a fuck buddy would ever happen again. He had his back turned to Cain's side of the bed, and tried to steady his breathing. Cain whistled some unknown song quietly to himself as he stripped of his clothing, Abel hearing the sound of fabric hitting the floor. For a fleeting second, he felt saddened at Cain's disregard for the time Abel put in to tidying up their closet of a room. But there was no time to properly lament, the pressure on the bed deepened and he could feel Cain's breath on the back of his neck.

"Baby?"

Abel's heart stopped mid-beat, because there was that strange voice again. That voice that wasn't Cain. Abel stayed quiet and kept his breathing even, he was asleep, dead asleep. This was all dream. Whatever was happening wasn't real. Cain wasn't running his fingertips up and down his arms. He wasn't nuzzling the top of his head, inhaling softly, silently.

"Mmm…how do you smell like roses when we're millions of miles away from a garden." 

The silence and lack of movement that followed made Abel think he was going insane. Cain might have said this, but he might have not and Abel might have just heard it in his head. Maybe he was finally going crazy. People who didn't dream went crazy, didn't they?

"Точно так же как принцесса, beautiful and sweet." Cain whispered in his ear, a final statement. 

There was a sharp bite on his earlobe and the sound of a snarl. Abel then feigned being awake, lightheaded and suddenly trembling, as Cain proceeded in devouring what was left of him. A whimper and a low, resounding moan went on forever into the dark, and echoed until the bustle of fighters and navigators could be heard through the doors once more. 

When Abel awoke, there were no clothes on the floor, and the room was still clean.

***  
And so time and time again, for what felt like weeks but was probably just days, Abel carried on his minor deception. He couldn't think up excuses anymore. He just wanted to feel his whispers in his ear, his uncharacteristically soft touches on his limbs. He wanted to feel what he felt back, if only for a little while. If only through closed eyes. He wanted that Cain, the one who only appeared for a seconds at a time. The one that whispered unknown words dripping with want and need. The Cain that treated him so delicately, as if Abel would fade away or break. Always disappearing as quickly as a morning fog, leaving bruises on the Earthling's white skin and heart. Abel would then open his eyes to Cain's own. He would see for himself that they were lacking affection in the sooty depths, replaced instead with intensity and a feral curve on his mouth. But Abel could still feel the tingling in his ear where he'd been called beautiful, and the light kisses on his lips that were still warm. And Cain's stares on his skin started little fires all over Abel's body, rendering him unable to think beyond that.

***

Tonight was different. Tonight, the touches remained soft, but his whispers never came. Abel was having trouble keeping his eyes closed, not wanting this Cain to fade away too, not like the tea or the cold, cold bed of his past. He wanted, no, needed this Cain to still exist. Needed those words, needed to be told he was beautiful and special, and his. Abel needed to know, needed to feel like maybe his promise to keep them alive was still possible, if only through knowing that this Cain was still here. 

"Princess, I know you're awake."

Abel's breathing stopped.

"People who are asleep don't usually scrunch up your eyes like you do." 

He could hear traces of that damned smirk in his voice.

"I…I'm sorry. I have trouble falling asleep sometimes." Abel finally managed to whisper.

"Then why do you pretend to be out of it when I come back here every night, baby?"

Abel was silent. Then he heard a chuckle, that knowing chuckle of his. 

"You like it when I whisper sweet nothings in your ear?" he wrapped a long arm around Abel's slender waist and rested his head on his shoulder.

"I just felt good when you said those things." Abel's voice was close to breaking, close to shattering into a million pieces like his heart. There was no reason to lie anymore.

"Felt better than when I fuck you?" 

"No, no. It's just... different."

Cain began to kiss his neck, breathing hot air into his ear as he did so.

"You little weirdo…if you liked it so much you should have just asked."

Abel's eyes closed, giving in to the pleasure of having his neck sucked and licked.

"W-would you? E-every..ngh…night from now on?"

"I'd do anything to fuck that sweet ass of yours, baby."

There was a heady silence that hung in the air then, and his hands traveled down Abel's body expertly, knowing exactly what he wanted and how to get it. He got on top of him, wild and quick, and gave Abel the same look a smug cat would give a flightless bird. Abel then decided he was fine with this Cain too. 

***  
He was awake until he knew it was time to get up, when Cain nuzzled into his hair and rubbed his sides to roll them over so they were spooning. In a couple of hours, they would both have to report to their respective duties, until it was time to rest again. Abel hadn't slept, replaying everything in his head. Over analyzing everything that had been exchanged. His life, after all, was subsequent events to be torn apart until it was all just bits and pieces and never a whole. 

Before he knew it, before he could stifle it and kill it and never let it see the light of day, Abel said "I'm going to keep my promise. And I'm going to be something special to you."

Cain didn't move, he just kept breathing. A soft 'tch', then,  
"Shut up, Princess. You need to either go to sleep or get ready for the day. And judging from all the fidgeting you did with your damn foot last night it's probably going to be sleeping."

Abel cringed and Cain's grip on his small waist tightened. Then he leaned in close to his delicate ear and whispered in that perfect soft voice,

"I meant everything. Just sleep."

Abel smiled sleepily and at that moment, he no longer cared if it was a few minutes or a few hours. His bed was small and full, and the space outside was infinite in it's own possibilities. Abel fell asleep and dreamed for the first time in months, about winning the war, about going home, safe and alive with a tall and dark youth holding him and smiling as they walked off the ship and into a blinding flash of white.


End file.
